


brighter, faster

by atemzug



Category: Day6 (Band), Dreamcatcher (Korea Band)
Genre: Angst without plot, Canon Compliant, Exes, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:34:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22066351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atemzug/pseuds/atemzug
Summary: In rekindling an old flame, what matters is that it still catches fire.
Relationships: Kang Younghyun | Young K/Kim Bora | SuA
Comments: 12
Kudos: 8





	brighter, faster

**Author's Note:**

> hello. this story is set around feb-mar 2017, just after minx re-debuted as dreamcatcher and day6 were busy with every day6, and before dc went on asc in april.
> 
>  **this is purely a work of fiction** , obviously, but in case it still needed to be said.

"How've you been?" are the words that first come out of Younghyun's mouth, sounding both familiar and foreign. He's sitting on the couch across the room, directly on the opposite side of the door Bora had just entered. His face is lit by a single lamp beside the couch, shadows playing across his face. 

She clears her throat. It's sore. "Good," she answers. It's not a lie. She's busy with practice and lessons, what with debuting for the second time around. It's tiring, but it gives her a sense of fulfillment. "You?" she asks, as if she hasn't been keeping tabs of over the past months, years even. Younghyun is probably just as tired as she is, if not even more, but there should be a stronger sense of fulfillment.

They've always had their differences.

"Been busy," he replies, smiling. It's still as warm and inviting, still as heart-fluttering. 

Bora wonders why the medicine she took for her sore throat isn't working.

She nods, pursing her lips. She's still standing by the door, a good few meters away from Younghyun. This distance is okay, safe; it should stay between them. 

"How were promotions?" he asks. He's obviously trying to lighten the mood up, but it's just as obvious in the way his eyes dart around the room that he's as nervous as Bora is. Then again, it's been years since she'd last seen those eyes. Things might have changed.

But she looks at Younghyun - _really_ looks at him - for the first time in years, and she feels a pang in her chest. Her eyes haven't fully adjusted to the dimness inside the room, but looking at Younghyun has always been easy, even if it's painful. A lot has changed, but when she looks at him, she could still see the same seventeen-year-old she fell in love with when she was sixteen. She could still see the same eighteen-year-old she had to leave so both of them could make it in an industry where the people around them saw them both as threats to each other's success. She looks at Younghyun, and he's obviously changed so much, yet she still sees the person she fell in love with so easily, and never really fell out of no matter how hard she tried. 

"Tiring," she answers finally. "How were yours?"

"Not as tiring as this," Younghyun answers, looking away. 

Bora closes her eyes. "Why are here, then?" she asks. She lets her back hit the door, supporting her. 

"You answered my call," he replies, still not facing her. 

"I didn't know it was you."

"But you didn't hang up."

She lets out a laugh. "I didn't," she agrees. "I should've."

"Bora--"

"I should go," she says through lump in her throat. She opens her eyes, only to close them again so the tears won't fall. When she opens them again, Younghyun's already standing in front of her. The distance is gone, and she's not safe anymore - from herself, her heart.

"Did you listen to our song?" he asks, smiling softly, looking at her directly.

"Which one?"

"The latest."

"I haven't had the time," she lies.

The smile on Younghyun's face disappears. He looks down, laughing. "Of course you haven't."

Silence, long and excruciating. The sound of shaky breaths clearly holding in so much feels almost physically painful. 

"I know you're busy," Younghyun says after a while. "I know I'm holding you up but i just-- I can't let you-- I don't want you to go."

"This is so stupid," she mumbles under he breath.

She doesn't want to go, either.

 _"It's not that you can't be in love,"_ Minji had once told her. _"It's just that you can't act on it."_ She'd said it so simply, like it was something inconsequential, like this didn't suddenly crush seventeen-year-old Bora's heart because she realized that seventeen-year-old Minji was right. And she hated that Minji was right, so she said nothing. But deep down, she knew she'd already made up her mind. 

It's been years since then, but from time to time she still wonders what would've happened if she hadn't broken up with him. Would they have been happy? Would they still have debuted? Would they have stayed together or would they have just parted ways in the end?

One thing's for sure, though: they wouldn't be standing here right now, so close but so afraid to move. It's as if a single breath of air could cause a crash, take them both down with it, leave them in ruins.

"I really loved you, you know?" Younghyun whispers. "Think I still do."

"Don't say that," Bora replies weakly. A shaky breath. Then, an even weaker, "I might believe it."

Crash. 

Younghyun presses their lips together, and Bora badly wants to say she can push him away. But she can't. All she can do is kiss him back. Because she's been craving for too long and now that he's here, what else can she do?

 _"I think it's better if you just don't fall in love at all,"_ Minji had told her too. Bora couldn't agree more. Everything really would've been better if she hadn't fallen in love with Younghyun. Everything would've been easier.

But she doesn't want to think about how hard and complicated things _are_ now, not when Younghyun's lips feel soft and warm against her neck again, not when his hands are on her waist again, not when she can hear him breathe her name out like a silent prayer again. 

It's so nice to feel this again.

The few meters separating them should've stayed between them.

This is too much. 

She can't take it.

Yet she can't pull away.

It's him who pulls away first.

They're both breathing heavily when they draw back.

"I can't do this," she says under her breath. Because if she does, she wouldn't know what to do once it ends. 

He brings a hand up to her cheek, slowly, carefully, as if she's some piece of fragile china his grandmother likes to keep inside the old, antique cabinets in their ancestral house. Calloused fingertips graze her cheek, rough but welcome. 

"Just one night," he whispers before leaving a kiss on her forehead. His lips are a stark contrast to his fingertips; they're soft and plump, warm on her skin. "Please."

She clutches at his jacket, her hands balling into fists. She pulls him close, wrapping arms around his waist. "I missed you," she whispers back.

His thumbs caress her cheeks, wiping away hot tears that didn't even get the chance to fall. His eyes shine with unshed ones, too, and Bora's heart aches so much at how painfully familiar the scene is. It feels like she's seventeen again, fully realizing for the first time that this relationship won't work.

She's always been too invested in her dreams.

He's always been too invested in her. 

They've always had their differences.

He presses his forehead against hers. He asks again, "Have you listened to--?"

"Yes," she admits this time. She listened to it as soon as it dropped - as she did with each and every song Younghyun's band has ever released - and she listens to it every day, sometimes crying herself to sleep at night knowing where all of Younghyun's lyrics came from. It gives off such a heavy feeling, knowing she's made someone feel that way. "I'm sorry--"

Younghyun leans in, catches her lips with his. 

Something else catches too.

Old flames burn brighter the second time around.

Old flames burn out faster, too.

At the moment, at least, the flame is still burning.

They don't have much time until they have to douse it again. 

What Bora has never considered is that they're exactly the same. She's always been too invested in her dreams. Younghyun's always been too invested in _his,_ too; only, his dreams have always included her.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!
> 
> [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.qa/crashingfalling)


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